Daily Fantasy Basketball 2015: DraftKings NBA Lineup Advice for Dec. 29
A key theme to watch in Tuesday night's NBA schedule is the amount of teams playing in the second half of back-to-back games on the road. There's a total of five games on the schedule and every matchup aside from the Detroit Pistons at the New York Knicks features a team on the road after playing on Monday night.
This predicament can lead to tired legs for the road teams; which in turn could provide the home team an increased chance of victory. Those potential victories will likely render some healthy fantasy stats. That's where DraftKings players can benefit.
Here's a look at a few players who stand to produce on a high level on their home floor:
Will Barton ($6,900)
The wiry Denver Nuggets swingman is quietly having the best season of his career. He's averaging 15.8 points, six rebounds and 2.5 assists per game. That has led to 35.3 fantasy points per game (FPPG), per Basketball Reference.
Bobby Marks of Yahoo Sports talks about the huge bargain Barton is for the Denver Nuggets in the world of real-life NBA salaries:
He's got to be a leading candidate for Most Improved Player. Barton should be atop DK player's list of guys to draft on Tuesday night. The Nuggets are hosting LeBron James and the Cleveland Cavaliers. On the surface, that might look like a game that could potentially turn into a blowout.
On further examination, this could be a pitfall game for the Cavs. Cleveland won 104-97 on the road against the Phoenix Suns on Monday night, which was a game in a time zone two hours behind their Ohio alarm clocks.
Less than 24 hours later, the Cavs will be in Denver to take on a Nuggets team that hasn't played since its 122-112 loss on the road against the Oklahoma City Thunder on Sunday.
Mix in the high altitude of the Mile High City, and this looks more and more like a game the Cavs could struggle to win. It's easy to see a hustling and scoring player like Barton being a catalyst for a not-so-unlikely victory for the Nuggets.
Kenneth Faried ($6,100)
Barton can't do it alone. Kenneth Faried is the Nuggets' leading rebounder and biggest effort player. If the Cavs are indeed a tired bunch as predicted, Faried's work on the glass could be especially good for DK players.
Faried is averaging 12.9 points and 8.8 rebounds per game this season. He's coming off one of his best fantasy performances as well. Per Basketball Reference, Faried's 45.3 fantasy points in the aforementioned loss to the Thunder was his second-highest output of the season.
The best was a 47.8-fantasy-point game against the Los Angeles Lakers on November 3. A hot Faried could be one of the better values of the evening for DK players.
Dwight Howard ($6,500)
The Houston Rockets will also be rested and waiting on a potentially weary Atlanta Hawks team on Tuesday night. The Hawks lost 93-87 on the road against the Indiana Pacers on Monday. The trip from Indianapolis to Houston is easily the most brutal overnight trek a team is faced with between Monday and Tuesday.
Thanks to a limited amount of field goal attempts (8.1 per game), per Basketball Reference, the Rockets' Dwight Howard is having his worst statistical season since his rookie year. Since he hasn't had more than 11 field goal attempts in a game this month—and only three times all season—Howard isn't likely to get you fantasy points with buckets.
His best fantasy performances this season have been on the strength of monster rebounding games. He's had three games this season with 50 or more fantasy points. In those contests, Howard is averaging 18.3 rebounds.
The Hawks are 29th in the NBA in rebounding, per ESPN.com. After playing on Monday, it stands to reason, Atlanta's rebounding effort might be even more shoddy than normal. This is a great spot for Howard to explode for another 50-fantasy-point game.
Andre Drummond ($9,400)
OK, Andre Drummond and the Detroit Pistons aren't at home, and their opponents, the New York Knicks didn't play on Monday night; However, Drummond has proven to be such a fantasy beast this season, he's exempt from the overall theme we've established in this article.
Drummond is averaging 46.3 FPPG in December, per Basketball Reference, and he's as capable as anyone in the NBA of putting up a 70-fantasy-point game. He has two of them this season and one near-miss at 68.8. The Knicks are a top-10 rebounding team, but Drummond is far and away the most dominant rebounder in the NBA.
He's leading the league with a per game average of 16.3, per ESPN.com. The Los Angeles Clippers' DeAndre Jordan is a distant second with an average of 13.2. Drummond won't be slowed on Tuesday and he could easily anchor a winning DK lineup.
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All DraftKings salaries per official website.
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